Spoilers for 7.23! Proceed at your own risk! I get nothing for writing this crack fiction. All is owned by Chuck and Bill and Warner Bros.

Amy's Cryptogram

It was well passed 2am and Sheldon frowned at his white board. Forget all forms of scientific enquiry. He had a new mystery to unlock.

What the hell did Amy mean by that?

They'd been cleaning up the kitchen while the newly engaged couple held court in the living room. She'd been casual, he'd been fretting. Sheldon knew there was nothing like one hen getting a shiny bauble and a proposal of marriage to get the rest of them squawking. When Howard and Bernadette had gotten married, Amy had conducted a campaign to increase his affections for her. It had been singularly effective. If she tried something like that now? God knows what she could accomplish. Sheldon firmly decided he wasn't going to stand for a recurrence of that event. He waited for his moment to inform her that he knew her clever plan.

The moment, however took it's sweet time coming. He could barely catch her eye for the rest of the gathering. Amy spent the evening fawning over Penny with Bernadette. Sheldon knew what she was up to. She was trying to lull him into a false sense of security or worse Amy thought that by denying him her attention when he sought it, he would try harder to attain it. As if that would work on him.

Well, after tonight it would never work again, that was for sure. The only reason her fiendish ploy had worked tonight was Sheldon was onto her little game. Oh, yes. He was onto it.

"Amy…" he patted her arm, as she engaged with Penny and Bernadette about beach weddings versus theme weddings.

"Just a second, Sheldon," Amy patted his hand without looking at him. She went on to make an impassioned plea against a beach wedding because Leonard was a positive magnet for sand fleas and because only Penny and Raj tanned properly. By the time they took pictures the rest would look like the Staples Easy Button. She also reminded Penny that nicer venues made it less likely that a certain little Yorkie would wind up being her flower girl. Then Bernadette had chimed in about having an Old Hollywood theme for the wedding. This caused a flurry of excited hen noises.

This caused Amy to forget about him for another 23 minutes and 46 seconds. "Amy," he said, placing his hand firmly on her arm so that she turned to face him, "it has been 1426 seconds, I need to speak to you."

"Oops." She turned to the other women and winked, "Sorry, Sheldon, what is it?"

He rose from his spot and indicated she should follow him to his room. This caused a tipsy Penny and Bernadette to catcall after them and in the distance he heard Howard call out, "Amy, you close that deal, girl! You got this!"

Sheldon closed the door and frowned into Amy's smiling face, "This is such a great night!"

"The engagement is overdue. The period of wedding planning will be torturous." He observed, trying not to smile back. The vixen was trying to cause him to mimic her mood through modeling.

"Agreed on both counts, but they look so happy and I get to be maid of honor again!" she enthused. "She having Bernadette be matron of honor. But I am not going off the rails like last time." She rolled her eyes, and smirked, "Not exactly like last time."

Sheldon chuckled before catching himself, "I brought you in here because I think we need to make an amendment to the relationship agreement in light of the wedding. Considering your reactions during the planning phase of the last one."

Amy laughed suddenly, "Okay, I might kind of deserve that." She moved closer to him, so that he had to look down to see her. Kissing position and approximation. "You are worried I am going to start my little experiments up again?" He nodded, curtly. "Oh, Sheldon. Please don't be concerned. I am very happy to stay where we are as a couple right now. Do not worry about me wanting to engage in coitus with you in the foreseeable future. I promise I won't press you on the issue. I don't want you to suffer any undue stress on my account." Here she kissed his cheek and left the bedroom.

Well. What the hell did that mean? What did any of that mean? Sheldon looked at the closed door and whispered "What?"

5 hours later and he was still stumped. His findings were listed on his white board under the heading "Amy's Cryptogram"

Phrases are in English. The grammar is casual, but correct.

Each phrase introduces troubling concepts.

Amy is living rent free in my brain again.

The most troubling phrase was written in large block capital letters. 'DO NOT WORRY ABOUT ME WANTING TO ENGAGE WITH YOU IN COITUS IN THE FORESEEABLE FUTURE'.

Is Amy concerned about my feelings or does she no long desire to have coitus with ME or does she no longer desire coitus at all?

If she no longer desires to have coitus with ME, when did that start?

If she no longer desires to have coitus with ME, is it because our kissing is enough for her?

If she no longer desires to have coitus with ME, is it because our kissing is unsatisfactory?

She does not request kissing outside of situations outlined by the relationship agreement.

She has not attempted to escalate kissing by groping me or trying to engage in tongue kissing.

If she is concerned about my feelings, that is very considerate of her, I suppose. But she shouldn't sacrifice that much without at least trying to make me feel guilty. We aren't hippies.

If she no longer desires coitus at all, she might have a vitamin deficiency or some other lady issue that can be easily treated. Then she'll start making innuendos again. Not my fault!

How long is the foreseeable future?

If she doesn't want to engage with coitus with ME, does she wish to engage in coitus with someone else?

Scrawled below these lines in the same neat block capital letters. "WHY WOULD YOU SAY THAT TO A PERSON? WHY DIDN'T SHE KISS ME ON THE LIPS? WHY DOES SHE ONLY GO FOR THE CHEEK KISS?"

The next quotation came directly underneath, "I DON'T WANT YOU TO SUFFER ANY UNDUE STRESS ON MY ACCOUNT."

That's code. She just doesn't want to sleep with an aimless scientist without a field of study.

She thinks I am crazy, despite testing declaring the contrary.

She thinks I am over-stressed. She's read the studies about stress induced impotence.

Scrawled beneath this group, in crazy hand writing, "MY GENTIALS ARE ESTHICALLY PLEASING AND FULLY FUNTIONAL! ASK THE ADHESIVE DUCKS ABOUT MY VIRILITY, VIXEN! ASK ABOUT THE LAST SIX WEEKS! THEY'VE BEEN DOUSED IN WAY MORE THAN SOAPY WATER, LADY! AND THE ADHESIVE DUCKS WOULD LIKE ME TO ENGAGE YOU IN COITUS SO THEY DON'T HAVE TO TAKE THAT HIT 3 NIGHTS A WEEK!"

Sheldon now began writing with outside the boundaries of any style manual without worrying about clarity of expression, and he was sing yelling as he wrote.

"So you get to decide when and if we will engage in Coitus, now? Just because I got to decide the last several years, now I don't "have to worry about it?" You want to save me stress, Doctor Fowler? Look at my white boards! It ain't working little girl!" He paused to glare at the board when there was a knock at the door.

"Sheldon." Amy's voice called, "I am coming in."

Panicked Sheldon flipped his white boardS to face away from the door, "Come in!" he frantically moved to the island trying to think how a normal person might act right now. He grabbed the kettle and started to make tea.

Amy stumbled into the room, in the thin cotton night gown that Bernadette had given her for last birthday. It lacked the concealing fortitude of her favorite flannel nightwear. It also explained why Amy now slept wrapped in the yoga shawl she currently wore over the nightie. "Leonard called me and said you were flipping out." She said sitting down at the island and looking up at him with sleepy eyes.

Sheldon huffed, "I have no idea what he is talking about. He probably had a dream." He put their tea mugs on the counter between them, "You drove here in your nightgown?" he gazed at her intently.

"I drove here in my sleep." Amy replied, "I could be wearing scuba gear. So very sleepy. Is it a school night mom?"

"You don't know what day it is?" Sheldon opened the tea box and pulled out some chamomile tea, "What did you think you were going to do if I was flipping out?" Seeing his exhausted girlfriend, willing to drag her cookies all the way from Glendale just to prevent him from… Wait a second! "You were pretty quick to believe that I was flipping out, or whatever Leonard called it, weren't you?" he narrowed his eyes. He thrust the chamomile back in the box and took out the caffeinated Orange Pekoe.

Amy became mildly more alert, "are we going to have another talk? We just had a talk at the party. Can't we just chat or shoot the breeze or rest our eyes for a second?" She looked up at her stern boyfriend who seemed to be making the tea extra strong. "Are you mad at me?"

"Confused by you. But I think that's exactly what you wanted."

"What are you talking about? Seriously. What?" the tired woman asked.

Sheldon stalked out from behind the island. "What? What, indeed." He turned around two white boards full of writing and gestured to them wildly. Amy frowned, stood up and ambled over to begin reading.

As she finished, Amy put her hands on her hips, now wide awake, "Okay. Seriously. What?" She snapped.

"You don't ask me what! I ask you what! What did you mean when you said, and I quote 'Do not worry about me wanting to engage in coitus with you in the foreseeable future. I promise I won't press you on the issue. I don't want you to suffer any undue stress on my account.'? What did you mean?" Sheldon asked his voice pitchy.

"Well, I didn't mean I thought you had stress induced erectile dysfunction. Or that your kissing isn't great." Amy was flustered, "I literally meant nothing you have written on these white boards." Then her eyes narrowed at him, "but if I did mean anything by it, I have just as much right as you do to take the possibility of coitus off the table anytime I want." She was going from embarrassment to sympathy to anger. All emotions she was too tired to process or suppress. Her eyes filled with tears as she sat down in her spot. She felt Sheldon sit down next to her.

"You never wanted to take coitus off the table before." Sheldon said quietly, "only after we started kissing. Are you saying it is a coincidence?"

Amy sighed, "No." she heard her boyfriend gasp softly and she grasped his hand, "it's because I have no idea what I am doing with any sexual. I wasn't even prepared for kissing. I am still not getting the hang of it." She finally turned to look at him, "You haven't noticed how bad I am at it?"

Sheldon looked confused, "You are not bad at it. You always act a little surprised for 2-4 seconds, but then you… come around. You kiss back, you make little happy noises, you smell good. I like kissing you."

"I don't know where to put my hands. Have you noticed them fluttering at my sides?" Her eyes were huge and tear filled, "I want to be more active, but I just let you do all the work."

"So you don't want consider coitus because you don't think you are good at kissing?" Sheldon asked.

"I am not being too hard on myself, Sheldon. I know I had a late start. I like kissing you. I just want to get better at kissing before we move on to the next step…"

"Which is?"

"French kissing.' Amy said definitively.

"Oh, boy."

"Yeah." Amy nodded. "but you know, you like kissing more than hand holding which arguably more germy. Maybe you'll be surprised."

Sheldon leaned back, "What's after that, frottage?"

"Slow down cowboy, we still have to figure out whose tongue goes in whose mouth." Amy smiled, shaking her head. She figured this might be a way to end this conversation.

"Your tongue goes in my mouth." Sheldon said firmly. "This Thursday."

"Okay, kind of fast. But okay." she nodded, "Can I ask you something?"

"You can ask about anything except what I wrote about the adhesive ducks." Sheldon looked at her sternly.

"How about your visually pleasing and fully functioning genitals? Can I ask about them?" Amy smiled.

"Fine, what do you want to know?" he acted more exasperated than he was.

"Nothing, actually. I pretty much just wanted to know about the ducks." Amy admitted.

"I am very sad for you." Sheldon pulled her off the sofa, "adhesive ducks tell no tales.